1. Field of the invention
This invention relates, generally, to the art of furniture construction. More particularly, it relates to furniture pieces made of interlocking parts where each part is a circle, a square, a triangle, or another basic shape or minor variation thereof.
2. Description of the prior art
Children enjoy learning if the subject matter is attractive and inviting. They dislike studying books for long hours and prefer to learn by working with their hands. For example, they learn more about basic two dimensional shapes such as circles, squares, and triangles when working with tangible objects that are formed in such shapes than when merely observing such shapes in a textbook.
A chair formed of interlocking triangular parts is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,712,837 to Swilley. Children who take the Swilley chair apart and reassemble it will gain some insight into the nature of triangles, but no such insight will be gained concerning the geometric properties of squares, circles, or other basic shapes.
Furniture items that can be assembled and taken apart by children but which are made of at least one circular part, at least one square part, and at least one triangular part are needed. Such items of furniture would enhance the learning skills of the children who play with them. Moreover, such furniture would have a pleasing appearance.
However, in view of the art considered as a whole at the time the present invention was made, it was not obvious to those of ordinary skill in this art that such furniture items were needed or how such items could be provided.